Go west young man.

I haven't shared this personal tidbit on my blog yet, or anywhere online for that matter. I haven't wanted to jinx anything. My wife and I put our house on the market earlier this year. Our goal is to move one town away to where I grew up, where much of my family is, to get our kids in to a better school system and to where we should have bought a house when we bought this one six years ago.



We recently accepted an offer and today we signed the purchase and sales agreement. There's no turning back now. On top of that, we have an accepted offer on the house we want to buy. So we've got some place to go, eventually. The sellers of our future home (pic below) are still house shopping and the closing date is a moving target but the expectation is that we'll be moved in before Thanksgiving.

That leaves us with six or so weeks (good god please let six be the max) without a home. Mom will be taking us in for the interim. I don't think she knows what she's in for yet. And maybe, neither do I. Among the challenges, including how to tame the tornado that is our two boys from destroying her house, will be the lack of my outlet, my "me" time away from the daily grind. All my tools will be in storage.

I suppose that will give me time to catch up on some reading, or better yet, some time to design a basement shop. Our new home will have a decent sized and completely unfinished basement. One side contains the boiler, oil tank and laundry. The other is wide open and just begging for sawdust. I don't have dimensions but I'd estimate that part of the basement to be roughly ten by twenty feet.

I'm pretty psyched to have a dedicated space for a shop. One that doesn't turn back in to a garage in the winter. It is truly a blank canvas and possibly a bit intimidating. As is, the space might function fine, but adequate light, noise dampening, dust control, and usable wall space doesn't yet exist. I'm not a carpenter and I'm not an electrician and I'm sure as hell not hiring someone so I better figure it out.

I'm also not sure where to start on shop design. If anyone reading this blog has any suggestions or can point me at some resources I'd be truly grateful. What works in your shop? What doesn't?

Thanks for reading,
Jim